i should be working (but i'm fixing my computer).

Google keeps doing things Right, which is rather inconvenient.  And, maybe not so good for FOSS.

And then I realized they are building the Matrix.  A cold shiver went up my spine.

...

It all started with my contact database.  Or, we should say, "databases" plural, as in scattered all over the place in different programs and not at all organized even though I try.

Plus my Blackberry did some borky thing, I don't know what.  All I know is that I have four copies of every contact on my Blackberry.  Seemingly, this has not "sync'd" back to Outlook on the Exchange Server.  So, I'm afraid to delete any of them, because that might delete the ONE copy I have on Outlook.  And then, that might delete ALL the ghost copies back on my Blackberry.  Something has gone seriously wrong.

So, now you are wondering, what has any of this got to do with Google?  Well, once again, Microsoft and Blackberry have got this "cloud" thing Wrong and Google has got it Right.

I have been holding out.  Even though I have Google sync on my Blackberry, I had not synchronized my Contacts.  That would be asking for [more] trouble, right?  And, I don't use Gmail.  On principle, actually -- one company should not have so much control over all of my everything.  What if they turned out to be Evil?  Or turned out to be Good, but then morphed into Evil?  Or were taken over by some other Evily company?

But, dang.  Google docs are very convenient -- so I have a few.  Not too many.  Just to test the waters, so to speak.

Then, I needed to get data from a proprietary calendar into a php app. I wrote.  Choice A was a cumbersome multi-step process I could not automate via manual sync of the calendar to Outlook, and thence via various proprietary Microsoft tools and thence ... well, yes I wasted the time creating the programming to do it, but there were too many points of manual intervention to make the whole thing worthwhile.

Whereas, the proprietary calendar company created a much nicer automated synchronization to Google Calendar.  Which from thence with one manual step, it is imported into my php app.  (If I only I actually knew how to do anything, I probably could automate even the manual step.  But, alas, I don't.)

And then I discovered, purely by accident, something really useful.  Because, since I had my work calendar now conveniently in Google, I could sync it to my Blackberry.  And ... if I did that, it would automatically sync back to my Outlook calendar!

Well, the screwed up contacts on my Blackberry made me wonder what would happen if I actually sync'd them to Google.  Where would they go?  Would I now have eight copies of everything?

Looking at this issue, I learned two interesting things.  The first one was directly applicable to my situation -- Google has a feature that will locate and merge duplicates.  Yahoo! (Or, maybe anyway).  And, actually, I don't mean the TM type of Yahoo!, just the excited utterance version.

The other thing I learned is that Google has an enterprise app. that can be installed to sync Outlook to Google (and then propagate it via Google).  Which is to say, if a company is using Outlook, Google has offered a streamlined portal to great savings.

So, I sync'd my contacts -- via the more simple Google Sync to my Blackberry -- and started rearranging and sorting them in Gmail -- and I was impressed.  Useful, well thought-out tools, at least from my perspective.

The reason my contacts are scattered over various databases is that I have repeatedly tried to solve my problem of getting all the data synchronized with wherever I am and whatever computer I am using.  I tried Outlook, various proprietary programs, versions of the Mozilla Suite and a php project management software system.  I've been using the php version for some time, but it is not as well written as Google's contact manager.  In fact, I have written some "addons" of my own to customize the process.  But that's rather time-consuming and suffers from the reality that it doesn't sync to my other apps.

What a Mess! So, Google's solution is Not a Mess and that is useful.

Not to mention, I keep coming across additional Google tools that are Really Helpful.  Such as the Google Gadgets on my desktop.  One of which is a calendar that pops up my day's agenda on mouse-over.  On all of my computers.

And, being on the Gmail page, I couldn't help but notice the new telephone call app.  So, I had to try it out.

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